Remember those who requested
prayer, just got word that Melvin's doing well, and Fred's sister's
having some difficulty with healing on that, on her operation, so
remember her in your prayers. Seek the Lord's help for her.
My mom sends her regards. For 97 and a half, she's doing
pretty darn good. Can't hear with a hoot and can't
see with a hoot. We're right up against each other's ears.
We're right up against each other's ears, hollering at each other. But health-wise, she's great. I think she's in better health
than I am. She's really good. So we're thankful for that. She's
doing good. But continue to remember those
others in your prayers. Seek the Lord's help for them.
As we begin our worship service, the hymn number is 475, Redeemed,
How I Love to Proclaim It. Redeemed, how I love to proclaim
it. Redeemed by the blood of the
Lamb. Redeemed through His infinite
mercy. His child and forever I am. Redeemed, redeemed. Redeemed by the blood of the
Lamb. ? His child and forever I am ?
Redeemed and so happy in Jesus ? No language my rapture can
tell ? I know that the light of His presence ? With me doth
continually dwell ? Redeemed, redeemed ? Redeemed by the blood
of the Lamb ? Redeemed ? Redeemed ? His child and forever I am
? I think of my blessed Redeemer ? I think of Him all the day
long ? I sing for I cannot be silent His love is the theme
of my song. Redeemed, redeemed, redeemed
by the blood of the Lamb. Redeemed, redeemed, His child
and forever I am. I know I shall see in His beauty
the king in whose law I delight, who lovingly guardeth my footsteps
and giveth me salt in the night, redeemed, redeemed, redeemed
by the blood of the Lamb, redeemed, redeemed. ? His child and forever I am ?
In number 517 on Jordan's shore, Stormy Banks, I stand. Here we go. On Jordan's stormy banks I stand
And cast a wishful eye To Canaan's fair and happy land Where my
possessions lie I am bound for the promised land Oh, who will come and go with
me? I am bound for the promised land. All o'er those wide extended
plains shines one eternal day. There God the sun forever reigns
and scatters night away. I am bound for the promised land. I am bound for the promised land. Oh, who will come and go with
me? I am bound for the promised land. No chilling winds nor poisonous
breath can reach that healthful shore. ? And death I felt and fear no
more ? ? I am bound for the promised land ? ? I am bound for the promised
land ? ? Oh who will come and go with me ? ? I am bound for
the promised land ? to reach that happy place and
be forever blessed. When shall I see my father's
face and in his bosom rest? I am bound for the promised land. When I sing that song, I think
of Moses. speaking to his father-in-law
when he was heading out and said, come thou with us, we will do
thee good. And that was a wonderful promise
he gave. Genesis chapter 49 and verse
27. The title of my message tonight is Devour
and Divide. Genesis 49 and verse 27. Benjamin shall raven as a wolf,
in the morning he shall devour the prey, and at night he shall
divide the spoil. Now Father, we are thankful for
your word, which is a lamp unto our feet and a light unto our
path, the entrance of which gives understanding to the simple,
and we know we are the simple, and we are thankful that you
have given us spiritual understanding. Through your grace and mercy,
this book opens up to us. We are thankful, Father, that
you did not leave us to ourselves here, that you interrupted our
career and showed us your son, taught us, and brought us to
his feet. We are thankful for the grace
that you have bestowed upon us, grace greater than our sins,
abundant grace. We know where sin did abound,
grace did much more abound. And we praise you for that. We thank you for the shed blood
of Jesus Christ, for that perfect death that he offered unto you,
that you accepted and were satisfied with. And because you were satisfied,
your law and justice were satisfied for everyone for whom that death
was made. We thank you for our sovereign
substitute, who even now, because he has purged our sins, sits
at the right hand of the majesty on high. We are thankful for the blessings
of the hour. We are thankful that we have
all spiritual blessings in Christ. We are thankful for new mercies
every day. We are thankful for life and
breath. We are thankful for our brothers and sisters in Christ.
We pray for those who are sick, those who are awaiting medical
procedures. We ask, Lord, you'd be with them
and watch over them. We help us, Lord, to remember
each other, call each other's name out to heaven. Help us, Lord, as we gather together,
that you might be pleased to, by your spirit, to take the things
of Christ and reveal them unto us. Oh, to see the master. to touch the hem of his garment.
We pray you'll give us a glimpse that we might worship you. In
Christ's name, amen. Now this is Jacob's description
of the second son born to the love of his life, Rachel. And
the description is concise and it is precise and describes Benjamin
in two ways. He is described as to what he
is, a wolf, a ravening wolf, and he's described as to what
he does. He ravens in the day, and at night he divides the spoils. And there appears to be a distinction
as to times here, they're important, especially as typology is applied
to Benjamin. The tribe of Benjamin proves
that he was a raging wolf, and proves to be true throughout
the Word of God. The wolf is often the stuff of
legend and mythology and throughout scripture. The wolf is almost
always exclusively described as ravenous, cunning, and powerful. In mythology, the wolf is attached
to Mars. the God of war, the warring God,
and his pursuits are martial pursuits or military pursuits. The tribe of Benjamin proved
to be great in war. With 26,000 men, he destroyed
and decimated an army of 400,000 in the Book of Judges in chapter
20. King Saul was of the tribe of
Benjamin. and a ravening wolf can be certainly
applied to him as his warring and his cunning. Though he was
clearly throughout scripture an evil man, the choice of the
people but not of God. Jewish writers apply these characteristics
to Mordecai in Esther as he destroyed the plots of Haman who had built
a gallows to hang Mordecai on. It was Haman that hung on those
gallows and received all the all that Haman had plotted to
gain for himself, Mordecai received and distributed it to the people
of Israel. Look over at Esther just for
a moment. The last chapter of Esther. Mordecai is described in the
last verse of the last chapter. Esther chapter 10 and verse 3
says, For Mordecai the Jew was next to the king Hazaros, and
great among the Jews, and accepted of the multitude of his brethren,
seeking the wealth of his people, and speaking peace to all his
seed. In the second part of the description
of what takes place after the wolf has destroyed his prey in
the daytime, it says, At night he divides the spoils, This probably
refers to the alpha wolf sharing his kill with the rest of his
pack. But as we well know, every aspect of this grand book that
we have in our laps in some way refers to Christ, to his work,
to his church, and to his gospel. The tribe of Benjamin is seen
throughout the Old Testament, mostly dealing with his tribe,
not Benjamin himself, but his tribe. And it is mentioned four
times, his name is mentioned four times in the New Testament. In the Acts of the Apostles,
he's referred to in reference to King Saul, because King Saul
was in the lineage of the tribe of Benjamin. In the Revelation,
when God's numbering the 144,000, he is named as one of the 12
tribes, of which 12,000 are. The other two times that he's
mentioned in scripture are personal references spoken by one of the
tribe of Benjamin who ravened as a ravening wolf in the morning
of his life and divided the spoils in the evening of his life. The
first time he refers to himself as in the lineage of Benjamin
is to prove that those who have claimed that the gospel disallows
the Jews He claims that Christ came to save some out of every
tribe, tongue, and nation, and His proof that God has not forsaken
the Jews is that He, who is a Jew, has been saved. Look over Romans
chapter 11. This is Paul the Apostle. He says in verse 1, I say thee,
and hath God cast away His people? God forbid for I am an Israelite
of the seed of Abraham and of the tribe of Benjamin. So we're talking about Paul the
Apostle as one who's of the tribe of Benjamin. The second time
he referred to himself as of the tribe of Benjamin he was
showing a specific thing to the people at Philippi. He was showing
them that salvation has nothing to do with lineage or any other
aspect of the flesh, but is entirely by the grace and the righteousness
of Almighty God. In Philippians chapter 3, Paul tells who are true Jews,
or who are true Israelites, who are the Israel of God, the church
of the living God. He says in verse 3 of chapter
3 of Philippians, for we are the circumcision. Now, he's talking
to believers. We are the circumcision. Now,
the church at Philippi, you know where that started? There was
a woman, a seller of purple by the river when Paul was called
in a vision to Macedonia to preach the gospel. This woman's name
was Lydia. and she was a Philippian and
she was by the creek worshiping God and Paul came to her and
preached to her the gospel and she received the brethren and
she opened up her house and that's where the church of Philippi
began in Lydia's house whom God opened her heart and that's where
we in this nation got the gospel because Philippi was the first
European church The first church in Europe was established in
Lydia's house. And now he's speaking to the
Philippians. And he says, We are the circumcision which worship
God in the spirit and rejoice in Christ Jesus and have no confidence
in the flesh. Now what he says following that
has to do with people having confidence in the flesh. What
does that mean? Confidence in the flesh means
that you trust the flesh or your flesh, your ability to bring
about a righteousness or merit a righteousness that God will
accept on the basis of what you've done. Paul said we don't have
any confidence in that. None whatsoever. He says though
I might also have confidence in the flesh, if any other man
think that he hath, whereof he might trust in the flesh, I have
more reason than anybody else to trust in the flesh. If a person
could get to heaven in the flesh, I could get to heaven in the
flesh, but no man can. He says circumcise the eighth
day according to the law. Before he even knew what the
law was or could say law or could walk or could talk, the eighth
day of his life He was circumcised. The law was kept for him. He
was of the stock of Israel. He said, I ain't got no strange
blood in me. I'm a 100% full-blooded Israelite. I was of the tribe of Benjamin.
I was the tribe of Benjamin. He said, and Hebrew of Hebrews.
You can trace my lineage back, all the way back, you won't find
anything but Hebrews. As touching the law, I was a
Pharisee. It says that because the law
said, accept your righteousness, or the Lord said, accept your
righteousness, exceed that of a Pharisee, he shall in no case
enter heaven. And the Pharisee had the best human righteousness,
as far as acts go, that anybody could have. Paul said, I was
a Pharisee. He goes on to say this, concerning
zeal, I was defending my God. I went
out persecuting the church, trying to destroy the name of Jesus
Christ because He wasn't for me. He wasn't for me. Touching the righteousness which
is in the law, I was blameless. Now that's something, isn't it?
I'm of the tribe of Benjamin. But what things were gained to
me, those I counted but loss for Christ. Yea, doubtless I
count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge
of Jesus Christ my Lord, for whom I suffered the loss of all
things. And it doesn't matter, I count them but manure, I count
them but dung that I may win Christ and be found in Him not
having mine own righteousness. which is of the law, but that
which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which
is of God by faith." Tribe of Benjamin, a ravening
wolf. This was Saul of Tarsus. In the morning of his life, when
he was going out with letters from the Sanhedrin, as one who
was of the tribe of Benjamin, he was a ravening wolf. He was
a terror to the church, causing havoc, persecuting, imprisoning,
beating believers, and seeking to wipe the name of Christ from
the face of the earth. He was relentless. He was relentless,
feared by so many. Even in the early church, many
people feared him just because of the reputation he had before
he met the Lord on the road to Damascus. When they said, the
Apostle Paul is coming, they said, we don't know if he's an
apostle or not. That's why so many times in his epistles he
says, I'm an apostle of the Lord Jesus Christ. I met Christ on
the road to Damascus. He taught me on the back side
of the desert. Why do you have to keep saying that? Because
of his reputation. He was a ravening wolf for all
those people. Relentless, relentless. But on
the road to Damascus, he met his nemesis and was summarily
conquered. And in the evening of his life,
he divided the spoils. preaching the gospel to Jews
and Gentiles alike, spending and being spent for the elect's
sake. To the law keepers, he became a ravening wolf through
the gospel, destroying their last message of hope in the power
of their flesh, while telling them of the spoils our Savior
meets out to all his elect, righteousness, justification, sanctification,
and redemption. Benjamin was a ravening wolf
in the morning, going for to pray. Bidget is described in
the text as a type of the Lord Jesus Christ. Our Lord is the
Lion of the tribe of Judah. And He's not described as a wolf
anywhere in Scripture. But these words apply to what
our Lord did for us. Because you see, we were born
into this world and there were three sovereigns that ruled every
aspect of our living day. We have never been in charge
of anything. Not since Adam's sin in the Garden
of Eden. We've been ruled. Ruled over,
manipulated, swayed, pushed, pulled, directed by three sovereigns
from our birth. One of those sovereigns is sin.
Another is death. And another is Satan. These were
our sovereigns. Look over at Romans chapter 5.
In Romans chapter 5, sin and death reigned over us.
That's what it says. It didn't say it affected us
or it was out there for us to choose. It reigned over us. Verse 13 and 14 of Romans 5,
it says, For until the law, sin was in the world, but sin is
not and computed where there is no law. Nevertheless, death
reigned. Death reigned. From Adam to Moses,
even over them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam's
transgression, who is the figure of him that was to come. Death
reigns even over babies. That's what it says. I've buried
babies. Why? Because Adam sinned in the
Garden of Eden. Because sin reigns in this world.
No man has control over death. I know the whole The push of
the world today is to try to keep people living forever and
ever where they won't die. You don't have any rule over
death. It rules over you. Physically, naturally, death
still rules over men. It was our sovereign. So we couldn't
stop it. We couldn't control it. We couldn't
do anything about it. In fact, we feared it. We feared
it, not so much about the dying itself, but what comes after.
We, as human beings, there's a sense of right and wrong in
all of us, even regardless of how evil or lack thereof we are,
there's a sense of right and wrong, and there's a sense in
all of us that there is a day of reckoning. There's an accounting
to be done somehow. We just don't get by with stuff.
That's why children, even young children, when they do something,
they get that look on their face like, I didn't do it. Why don't
they have that look? Why don't they just fess up and
say, I did it? Because they know even at an early age there's
a reckoning. What is that reckoning? What do we understand? We're
going to die someday. We're going to die someday. Now,
I'm going to tell you, most of my life, even today, as I'm 75,
headed for 76 if I make it, I don't think much about death. I'm kind
of a living kind of guy. I just think about life more
than I do about death. But occasionally, I will be sitting in my chair
or something, and I'll start thinking about, well, man, you're
76 years old. You ain't got much longer. You're
probably not going to see your grandchildren graduate from high
school. Probably not. Surely not from college. I'm
gonna be gone. I'll be gone. And my friends might remember
me. And those who know me might remember
me for a while. But the next generation's not.
I'm gone. I'm gonna be gone and forgotten. And I think, then
I go out and meet God. I'm thankful that the day of
reckoning for me has already taken place. The day of reckoning
for every believer has already taken place. It took place on
Calvary 2,000 years ago when God reckoned our sins to be upon
Christ and punished our sins in Him. And reckoning was settled. But
we were born in this world ruled by death. We couldn't escape
it. We were ruled also by sin. Look at verse 20. Moreover, the
law entered that the offense might bound, but where sin abound,
grace did much more abound. Verse 21. That is, sin hath reigned
unto death. Sin has reigned unto death. Well,
I can just stop this. No, you can't. You're a sinner
by nature, by choice, and by practice. And that's still true
about the old man in us. Sin is reign. Sin and death were
no match for the King of kings and the Lord of lords. Romans
chapter 8 and verse 2 says this, For the law of the Spirit of
life in Christ Jesus has made us free from the law of sin and
death. For what the law could not do,
in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son
in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in
the flesh. Our Lord was like a ravening
wolf in the morning. By his death, he put death in
the grave. He put sin away as far as the
east is from the west. He put it behind God's back.
He buried it in the depths of the sea. And having slain his
prey, he brought in everlasting righteousness. Having devoured
his prey, he brought immortality to the light through the gospel.
And Satan was also our sovereign. I know silly preachers talk about
running Satan out of town and act like they can rebuke a cold
or, you know, or a fever in the name of Jesus and it's got to
flee. But Satan's handled us for all
our lives. and would still be doing so were
it not for the power of almighty christ satan ran our show too
powerful for us to handle we resided according to scripture
in his palace in his kingdom under his mighty thumb and it
says that his palace was in peace that's what the scripture says
his palace was in peace we were there ruled and reigned, and
we weren't disturbed. We weren't anxious. We weren't
upset. We didn't want to leave. We was
happy in the palace. The palace was in peace. But
though he was at peace in his temporary domain, there was a
ravening wolf on his trail. And though he would bruise the
heel of that wolf, that ravening wolf would bruise his head and
put him out of business. he was our sovereign like sin
and death but a greater sovereign came on the scene and crushed his head that's recorded
for us in the gospels in Matthew and in Luke in Matthew chapter
12 verse 28 and 29 they have accused our Lord of being a devil
he said I ain't no devil the house divided itself against
itself can't stand he said I cast out devils I cast out devils. In verse 28 of chapter 12, he
says, But I, if I cast out devils by the Spirit of God, then the
kingdom of God is coming to you. Or else, how can one enter into
a strong man's house, that's our sovereign, Satan, as we lived
in this world, as we were born in this world, strong man's house,
and spoil his goods, except he first bind the strong man, and
then he will spoil his house. then he will spoil his house
you mean the only way for us to be delivered from that palace
for our peace in sin to be disturbed is for a sovereign greater than
our sovereign satan to overcome him and bind him and spoil his
house, to take from him what he trusts in? Look over at Luke
chapter 11. The same words are spoken and
recorded by Luke. In Luke chapter 11, verse 20 and 21, it says, But with the finger of
God I cast out devils. evidently binding Satan wasn't
a whole lot of effort of the Lord Jesus Christ, he says, with
the finger of God. I cast out devils, no doubt the
kingdom of God is coming to you. When a strong man armed keepeth
this palace, his goods are in peace. But when a stronger than
he shall come upon him and overcome him, he taketh away from him
all his armor wherein he trusted, and divideth the spoils. There's the ravening wolf falling
upon his prey, Satan, and dividing his spoils. That's the morning
and the evening of our Lord's ministry. The prince of this
world is cast out by the substitutionary death of the absolute sovereign,
the Lord Jesus Christ. Over in Colossians chapter 2,
it's worded this way. Colossians chapter 2 and verse
15 says, and having spoiled this is talking about Christ on the
cross having spoiled principalities and powers he made a show of
them openly triumphing over them in it that is in his cross what
he did is recorded for us in history in a prophecy of Isaiah
in chapter 53 which you're very familiar with Isaiah chapter
53 and verse 10 says this, Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise
him. He hath put him to grief, when thou shalt make his soul
an offering for sin. He shall see his seed, he shall
prolong his days, and the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in
his hand. He shall see of the travail of his soul, and shall
be satisfied by his knowledge. Shall my righteous servant justify
many? For he shall bear their iniquities.
Therefore will I divide him a portion with the great and he shall divide
the spoil with the strong because he's poured out his soul unto
death. He was numbered with the transgressors. He bared the sins
of many and made intercession for the transgressors. Now is
the evening of the wolf, the day in which we live, and his
pack enjoys the spoils of his victory. you tonight as you sit
here as believers in the Lord Jesus Christ you have everything
that God could ever give a man or a woman everything you lack
nothing you are complete in him where did you get that? your
sovereigns were overcome they were spoiled and the spoils were
divided among his people Benjamin shall raven as a wolf in the
morning he shall devour the prey night he shall divide the spoil. Let us pray. Father, thank you
for the truth of the word. Thank you for the success of
our Lord Jesus Christ on the cross. Help us to rehearse it
in our mind. We pray in Christ's name. Amen.